Weekend recap. The Fightin’ Irish strike again… kind of

So, apparently, I nearly got into two separate fights on Saturday night, within twenty minutes of each other.

Friday evening Tom and Terri came by for pizza and just to hang out. Good times. We watched the first two episodes of “Long Way Round” and chatted it up quite a bit. Which was nice. It had been a while since we had just sat around and shot the shit with them.

Saturday was where things got interesting. Jean and I headed down to Meg and Craig’s around noon to meet up with Craig’s sister and brother in-law, grab some lunch, head to the race track to watch some horse racing, and then catch the Cake concert that evening in the infield.

The racing was pretty good to Craig, but not quite as nice for the rest of us. In the one race Jean and I bet on, our horse came in dead stinking last. I mean you couldn’t get more last than this horse. He was at least 2 full lengths behind the rest of them. So there went our $8 for the day. Even after consulting Jean’s dad for advice (they go to the track every year for a 2 week holiday) we were so depressed about our losses that we decided to cut it and move on with the day at hand.

Which of course meant heading to the infield for the Micro-brew fest, some munchies and the concert. Oh, but if only it was that easy. With our luck for the day, we got to the infield 15 minutes after they stopped selling wrist bands for the Micro-brew fest. So we were relegated to paying $7 per plastic bottle of Coors Light. Not exactly my idea of good drinking, but damned if I didn’t NEED a drink by that point, so I sucked it up and sucked a few down.

Cake was good, even if the lead singer was being an arrogant little prick for the entirety of the show. The bassist was astounding. Clearly he is the best musician in the band and is the one holding it all together. He can lay down a serious groove.

We walked away from the concert in good spirits; a bit sore from standing for a good 2 hours, but happy none-the-less.

Which is why I am amused that the next few events took place…
As we were walking through the tunnel from the infield to the stadium seating and parking, Jean and I were hand-in-hand and a few paces in front of our gimpy co-horts (seems Meg AND Karen both have bum feet right now). Between us was some group of “kids”, probably around 25 years old. Most likely stoned and/or drunk from the looks of them. One of the taller ones decided to play kick the cup and proceeded to kick said cup into the back of my feet a number of times. He kicked it along side of me to where it would come into my vision between Jean and I and to my outside, as well as hitting the backs of my feet. I’d say this happened around 10 times. About the 10th time, I had enough and lost my patience waiting for him to stop. So I turned, puffed up and gave him a look indicating I wasn’t pleased, then said “what’s up?” in a fairly aggressive tone. My intent here being to make him simply back down and stop kicking the cup.

Apparently his girlfriend, or whoever she was, thought I was about to take his head off, because all I heard from here was, “sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry…” in an obvious attempt to defuse the situation and prevent a fight. Which I find amusing as I had no intention of throwing down. I just wanted him to stop hitting me with the damned cup. My entire issue here was about respecting other people. I had no problem with him kicking the cup, just don’t kick it into me.

To hear Craig tell it, he thought I was about to go ballistic on the guy. I guess I can look pretty intimidating and/or psychotic when I get angry. Who knew.

It was a long walk back to the cars, and I had “cooled down” by the time we were out of the tunnel. We were even laughing about it before we even made it to the parking lot. Which is important because the next event hinges on the fact that I was still in a good mood and laughing and not pissed off in the least.

So it is even more amusing to me when I nearly got hit as I walked in front of a stopped SUV as it waited to merge into the exiting traffic. I guess she just didn’t see me, even though I was a foot in front of her bumper, in her headlights and moving at a fair pace. So when she tapped my thigh with her bumper, I smacked her hood with my open palm (which makes a GREAT startling sound) and proceeded to give her the same look I had used minutes previously with the dumbass and his cup. And what does she say? “I’m sorry…..” I look at her again, and she says it again: “I’m sorry”. One more time… “I’m sorry”. At which point I have had enough. In my mind, “I’m Sorry” just doesn’t make everything better. Just because you say I’m sorry does not mean you immediately get my forgiveness. And in today’s day and age, the words “I’m sorry” just don’t carry water. Hell Terri just had her SUV hit in the parking lot and all that jackass was going to do was park and walk away. When Terri confronted him, he thought an “I’m sorry” was going to make everything ok. Well, let me tell you, it doesn’t work that way… so when this girl in the SUV says it one more time, I stopped in my tracks (about 5 feet past the SUV by this point), looked at her and said, “Sorry isn’t good enough”, and when her passenger started talking smack, I puffed up again and began walking towards the SUV. That’s when the driver drove away… and that’s also when I found out that apparently that single phrase I uttered was hysterical to my friends…

I just wanted the driver to understand that saying “I’m sorry” does not wash away all your sins. There is indeed something called personal responsibility. Saying I’m sorry does not absolve you of that. Unfortunately, this seems to be a concept which has been lost to this generation. I am tired of others not taking responsibility for their own actions, especially when it effects me. The driver was just unlucky enough to have me cross her path, both literally and figuratively.

To hear Craig tell it again, I was ready to jump on her hood and beat in the windshield. Or more to the point, that was the look I had. And that really amuses me. I don’t see myself as any kind of threat to anyone. I’m a nice guy. I haven’t been in a physical fist fight since 7th grade. When it comes down to it, I’d run before throwing a fist nowadays. But I guess I can exude a look that distinctly says: Don’t fuck with me. That’s good to know for future reference…

We all had quite a few good laughs at my expense for the rest of the night.

Sunday I slept in and lounged around for a while until it was time to go to my parent’s house for my sister’s birthday. If she could only learn to not repeat herself 5 times in the same breath, visiting would be so much more enjoyable. Luckily everyone was hungry early, so we were able to take her out to Cosmo’s and reduce the amount of time we’d have to stick around. Dinner was fabulous, as always, and Jen was on good behaviour too. We were even able to get out for under $90 for 5 people, including wine and make it back to the parent’s for cake and ice cream. We also counted ourselves lucky to make it home alive and just after 8pm, so we still had some time for us before we went to bed.

All in all, it was an odd and interesting weekend. Fun, exhilarating, and annoying at times, but good none-the-less.